NINETY beds and 104 jobs are to be axed as part of the latest round of cash cuts at North Cheshire Hospitals Trust.

The trust, which runs Halton and Warrington hospitals, agreed to a financial recovery plan last November to solve a huge deficit and save £18.4m.

Now the trust has announced it has discovered 'inefficiencies' in the bed and theatre system and has decided to make further sweeping cuts to 'improve the patient experience'.

The beds will be axed between April and June across a range of specialities on the Warrington site, including medicine, general surgery, gynaecology, trauma and orthopaedic surg ery.

The cuts mean the number of posts at the hospital will be reduced by 104 - but management has pledged there will be no redundancies. Instead, vacant posts will re-main unfilled.

The trust axed 105 beds at the end of last year following the transfer of acute medical wards and planned surgical services to Halton Hospital.

Dr Stephen Bentley, the consultant physician who has led the changes, said: 'Many patients have undoubtedly been staying in hospital longer than they should because of unnecessary delays in the system.'

Two operating theatres are also to be closed at Warrington Hospital.

The first will close in April and the second in June, when even more planned surgical activity will transfer to Halton Hospital.

Fifteen jobs will go but staff will be redeployed to other areas.

Mr Moody said: 'It's only when you begin to look at the detail of how theatres work that you see how much staff and theatre time could be saved if everything worked more efficiently.

'The transfer of planned surgery to Halton will en-sure patients requiring planned surgery are guaranteed admission on the agreed date.'

Trust chief executive Catherine Beardshaw added: 'I have been very open about the financial challenge the Trust faces.

'Our financial recovery plan requires us to save £18.4m by March 2008 and we are making good progress towards this.'